Not Your Run-Of-The-Mill-Reporting!

Seven-Month Old Baby Boy and Sister Kidnapped by Tennessee DCS!

Steffen Rivenburg Jr. was born at Vanderbilt Hospital in Nashville Tennessee on October 15, 2016, with Down Syndrome and heart defects but otherwise was a healthy baby “he was thriving and doing well at home with his parents and big sister, Annalise, who was in first grade.” according to the website MedicalKidnap

But back on February 2nd, 2017 the unthinkable happened; while at a doctors appointment at Vanderbilt Hospital (the same hospital that Steffen Rivenburg Jr. was born in) Tennessee’s Department of Children’s Services (DCS) “seized 3-month-old baby Steffen, alleging abuse over the 3 missed doctor appointments.”

At the same time seven-year-old Annalise was also taken away by DCS at the local school she went to. Annalise’s grandmother Lisa Rivenburg waited for Annalise to get off of the school bus at her home, but Annalise was never dropped off. Lisa tells the Miller News Service that she ” started to freak out” when Annalise did not show up; ” and was “asking the neighborhood kids is she on the bus” which she (Lisa) says ” the kids said no maybe she fell asleep on the bus.” Lisa then called Annalise’s school “to no avail, they(the school) hung up on me.”; she then called transportation who then called the bus driver who told Lisa “she(Annalise) was never on the bus.” Lisa then said “that between 4-5 that evening the parents who were at the hospital at the called her on the phone saying “Mom we are being locked down” and that “they (DCS) already have Annalise, they picked her up at 2 p.m. from the school.” The parents also said that a “Synthia Steele from DCS was on her way down from Montgomery County down to Nashville to medically kidnap her grandson (Steffen) on a court order.”

The next day according to Lisa DCS “never showed up for a meeting the family (Lisa Rivenburg, Steffen Rivenburg SR and Patricia Tornberg) on Friday night(February 3rd 2017.)” In fact the Rivenburg family did not get to see the children until Monday, February 6th, 2017 where Lisa observed “that the kids look sick,” and were told by DCS officials that the grandchildren had been vaccinated “without our consent by a doctor” from the Rivenburg family, says Lisa. Lisa “also changed Steffen’s diaper twice while at the DCS’s office with the Resource Parent and noticed that his stool was bloody,” which DCS told her “was caused by constipation.” Lisa says “that DCS was always changing his formula,” which was causing constipation.

According to the MedicalKidnap website “Baby Steffen was taken from his parents and placed into foster care, he caught a very serious viral infection on February 17 which caused damage to his heart. A heart surgery that the parents were told would not be needed until he was 6 months old became necessary on February 23. That was followed by 3 more heart surgeries and other procedures on his tiny body. He is currently hooked up to an ECMO machine – extracorporeal membrane oxygenation machine, or a heart-lung bypass machine. Healthline.com says the ECMO machine is used with serious, but reversible, heart or lung problems, and with the machine, the survival rate “can rise up to 60 percent.” Doctors at Vanderbilt Hospital, however, wanted to take Steffen off of life support Tuesday, May 30. Tennessean Judge Raymond Grimes, who was standing in for Judge Wayne Shelton who is overseeing the case granted an injunction the same day until June 6th at noon.

Lisa tells the Miller News Service and Health Impact News that the “DCS refused to allow the family’s pastor to come to see the baby. He was finally permitted to come on Saturday, but DCS reportedly kicked him and Lisa out of the room.” The DCS now “no longer lets the family visit Steffen at the hospital. Lisa tells the Miller News Service.

The Miller News Service did contact the Vanderbilt Hospital to check on Steffen’s condition. A hospital staff member who didn’t want to be identified told us “he was not in the system” and that Steffen may be a “no response patient.” We asked that same staff member what determines a no response patient, she told us “that if the patient does not want the family to know that he/she is in the hospital,” “the patient was shot or raped” that could fall into the category of no response patient.”

We should not forget that Steffen’s older sister of seven-year-old Annalise was placed in a foster home by DCS. Patricia and Steffen Sr. were in the process of searching for an “umbrella school” – a home-school cover school that they could use in order to legally homeschool in the state of Tennessee. They recognized that Steffen’s heart condition and upcoming surgeries created conditions under which homeschooling would work better for their family. Lisa was trying to get support from Home School Legal Defense Foundation which she says she used “to home-school all seven of her children.” Lisa did say that “there was some absentees and some tardies but that they were nullified by the court.” As we stated before Annalise was taken out of school by DCS without notifying Lisa Rivenburg who was watching the child that day because her parents were at the doctor’s appointment with Steffen. Lisa tells us that “the DCS wants to put her (Annalise) through psychotic therapy and psychotic drugs.”

The family of Baby Steffen has court on Monday morning, June 5th, at 9 am, and supporters are holding a rally and prayer vigil simultaneously at the Montgomery County Juvenile Court at Two Millennium Plaza, Clarksville, TN 37040. They are inviting people from all over to come and show support and pray to save Baby Steffen’s life.